A collapsible storage bag that can be relatively simply and easily evacuated and that effectively maintains the integrity of the vacuum has a variety of uses. A particularly useful application of such a bag is in storage and preservation of clothing. Compressing the clothing may significantly reduce the amount of space needed for storage. Also, clothing may be destroyed by exposure to the environment during long term storage. For example, various organisms such as moths or bacteria may ruin clothing. Limiting the air around the clothing may greatly help to preserve the clothing, because such organisms require oxygen to survive. Further, limiting the amount of moisture around the garment may inhibit the growth of mildew and additionally inhibit growth of destructive organisms.
An additional use of such a vacuum bag would be to store perishable food items. Tea, spices and other food items spoil or loose their flavor when exposed to air and moisture. In this respect, the user could control the climate of any hydroscopic material that could be stored in such a bag. Further, items compressed in a storage bag would have a reduced in volume and therefore could be stored with greater efficiency while maximizing storage space.
While similar containers exist, all current designs suffer from a number of shortcomings. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,203,458, issued to James T. Cornwell, discloses a disposable surgical garment container. The garment container includes a one way valve for air to be vacuumed from the container and an opening which may be permanently sealed. The garment is placed inside the bag and the seal is closed with the application of a heat source. Such a design is not reusable because the container must be permanently sealed. Thus, such a container is expensive and inconvenient for storage of clothing because a new storage bag must be used each time. Further, a new storage bag must be used if air leaks into the bag.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,480,030, issued to Sweeney et al., discloses a reusable evacuable enclosure for storage of clothing and the like. A polyethylene bag forms the body of the container, and a one way valve is installed in the surface of the bag to permit the bag to be evacuated. The bag includes an opening for inserting items into the bag, and the opening may be held closed by a hinged seal. However, such a design requires an additional component, the seal, that may be lost or broken. Also, the external seal pinches or crimps the bag, and may wear the bag and limit the reusability. Lastly, the external seal may not maintain the seal effectively over a longer time period.
All prior art designs that provide a reusable container suffer from similar shortcomings. Generally, they either are not reusable or, if they are reusable, do not effectively maintain the integrity of the seal over a longer period of time and repeated uses. For an application such as storage of clothing, the user is likely to store garments for an extended period of time on the order of weeks or months. A seal that is not effective or that leaks over the course of hours or days is not useful in such an application.
Zipper seals are generally used in applications in which the tightness of the seal is not critical, such as in common household sandwich bags. More robust zipper seals exist, but are only used in very different applications. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,847,711 issued to Howard discloses a heat-sealing system for plastic containers in which the system is only designed for liquids, and gas pressures or vacuums are never contemplated. Also, the basic configuration of the bag is quite different, in that the fastener is along the side of a bag that is heated to seal the edges.
Therefore, there is a need for a reusable, evacuable storage container that may be conveniently used, closed and evacuated, and reused and that effectively maintains the sealed environment.